


Numb

by TetrodotoxinB



Series: Whumptober 2019 [29]
Category: MacGyver (TV 2016)
Genre: Colder than a well-digger's ass in the Klondike, Colder than a witch's titty in a brass bra, Hypothermia, It's cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey, It's cold okay, Medical Care, Prompt: Numb, Whumptober 2019, day 29, that's the whole plot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-30
Updated: 2019-10-30
Packaged: 2021-01-12 22:27:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,412
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21233570
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TetrodotoxinB/pseuds/TetrodotoxinB
Summary: There's cold and then there'scold.Numb doesn't even begin to cover it.





	Numb

**Author's Note:**

> Beta'd by [Secret_Library98](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Secret_Library98/pseuds/Secret_Library98).
> 
> Also thanks to some slack pals for slapping me up alongside the head until my brain worked. Y'all know who you are.

Last night’s snow storm erased the tracks of Goldan and his men, making it harder to track them, so Mac and Jack have fanned out to cover more ground. Due to the time constraints of the mission, waiting for them to magically reappear isn’t an option, but given the terrain and a foot of unexpected snow, Mac thinks they’re making good time. 

Or he did, until he heard the loud _crack._

Mac knows what the sound is without turning around — ice. The _crack_ is followed by splashing and Mac takes off running, though he’s slowed by the snow. By the time that Mac gets near Jack, he’s already pulling himself out of the water.

“D- d- don’t,” Jack says, waving at Mac to stay back. 

Mac surveys the area and realizes Jack’s mistake. The creek must be much wider than it appears. Several feet on either side have frozen over enough to support the fresh snow, though definitely not a middle-aged ex-Delta. Jack must have misestimated the true size of the creek and fallen through the ice into the already swollen creek. Now he’s soaked in snow melt that had already come down the mountain in warmer days.

Jack falls several more times as ice gives way underfoot, each time soaking him in fresh ice water, before he clears the creek. Once Jack is safely landed, Mac hurries to his side. 

“Jack, what happened to your bag?” Mac asks.

Jack lifts a trembling arm and points to the creek. Mac can see where the backpack is hung up between some rocks. There’s no way to get it without getting soaked himself and water-logged like that, the pack won’t do them any good anyway.

“We have to make shelter and warm you up,” Mac says, pulling Jack to his feet.

Jack nods and his whole body shudders. Mac can tell that Jack’s doing his best not to shiver in an attempt to conserve energy, but that’s only good for so long before Jack’s temperature drops. According to his wrist watch, it’s -11C which means that Jack has, conservatively, half an hour before he’s severely hypothermic. 

They walk south along the creek and Mac digs in his cargo pocket for the sat phone. 

“Mac, you’re two hours early for check-in,” Matty says by way of greeting.

“Jack fell through some ice and he’s completely soaked. The air temp here is -11C. We need shelter ASAP. Can you find anything nearby on the sat-feed or maybe a park map?” Mac asks.

“It’s gonna take a minute to find something. Just keep heading south along the creek and I’ll let you know soon,” Matty says. 

“Thanks,” Mac answers and he cuts the call to conserve battery life.

“W- well?” Jack asks.

“Well, they’re going to see what they can find and let us know. We’re just going to keep moving until then.”

But moving isn’t exactly what Mac would call it. They’re dragging along at a shuffling pace and every so often Jack’s feet catch in the snow or on an unseen rock and he falls, taking Mac down with him. By the time that Matty calls back, Mac’s pants are starting to get wet from all the times he’s fallen and he’s getting colder.

“Matty, I hope you have good news. Things aren’t going well,” Mac says.

“I do have good news, assuming that you can make the trip. There’s a rangers’ station about a mile and a half from your current position. It’s closed until May, but it should have everything you need to get warm, including first aid supplies. I’m sending you the coordinates now.”

Mac lowers the phone to read the information, and it’s definitely going to be pushing their luck to make it that far with how fast Jack’s deteriorating. Quickly Mac checks the data on the phone and between his first call to Matty, from where Jack fell in, to where they are now, it’s been fifteen minutes and they’ve gone just under a quarter of a mile. At this rate, assuming that it’s even possible to maintain this speed, it’ll take them an hour and a half — more than three times Mac’s estimate of time to severe hypothermia. 

“Alright, Matty. I’ll check in when we make it, but it’s going to be slow going,” Mac finally says.

“I know, Mac. Just be careful and take of Dalton.”

The call disconnects before Mac can reply and he shoves the phone back into his pocket. “Come on, Jack. They found us somewhere safe.”

Jack nods, and together they shuffle off towards safety.

*****

Mac’s been quietly monitoring Jack’s decline as they walk. The slurring when he talks, the decreased coordination, the repeated questions, the now total lack of shivering — it all points to worsening hypothermia. If he had to guess, Mac would put Jack’s core temp somewhere around 31 or 32C — bad but not so bad they can’t fix this. The problem is, they’re just under a mile out from the rangers’ station and they’re moving at a crawl. If they can’t get there soon, Jack may not make it. 

Mac’s peering at the sat phone’s GPS again, when Jacks jerks away from Mac. “Hold on.”

Mac pauses and Jack starts tugging ineffectually at his jacket. 

“Jack, what are you doing?” 

“I’m hot. I don’t need this anymore,” Jack mutters. 

“No, no, no, no, no. Jack, you’ve got hypothermia. You need the coat, even if it’s wet,” Mac argues, grabbing at Jack’s hands.

Jack swats at Mac, slapping him with barely enough power to sting. “Get off me! I’m hot!” he slurs.

Mac grabs Jack’s wrist this time. “Jack, remember Delta training. You remember the cold survival courses? You remember dive training?”

Jack squints at Mac like he’s drunk and nods slowly. “Good. What did they tell you about taking off your clothes when you’re cold?”

“‘S bad,” Jack answers. “But I’m not cold anymore! I’m hot!!”

“No, you only think you’re hot because the hypothermia induced vasoconstriction has failed due to muscle fatigue. The blood rushing back to your muscles tricks your brain into thinking you’re suddenly warm, but you’re not — that’s the hypothermia talking. What you’re trying to do is called paradoxical undressing and it will kill you — in fact it’s what kills up to half of hypothermia victims, Jack. I need you to just let yourself be warm. Can you do that?”

Jack cocks his head like a golden retriever staring at a tennis ball. “So, I’m not hot?”

“No, Jack. You’re not hot,” Mac confirms.

“Does that mean that I’m dying?” Jack asks.

Mac puts his arm around Jack again and herds him in the direction of the rangers’ station. “Not yet, but if we don’t hurry things might get dicey.”

Jack frowns and nods. “Okay.”

*****

They make it another quarter mile, which puts them about a half mile from the rangers’ station, before Jack tries to take his jacket off again. Mac talks to him, tries to explain the situation, tries to reason with him, but Jack is having none of it. 

“Get the fuck off of me!” Jack shouts. He swings at Mac but his reflexes are dulled and Mac easily dodges him.

“Jack, stop!” Mac shouts. It’s maybe not the best impulse, but Mac tackles Jack to the ground and pins him with his hands behind his back until he stops screaming. “Are you done yet? Can we keep walking?”

“Why are we fighting?” Jack mumbles into the snow.

Mac rolls off and flops down into the snow, giving up on staying somewhat dry. “Jack, the cold’s affecting your brain. We have to keep moving.”

Jack shakes his head and rubs his face into the snow. “Don’t wanna.”

Fuck. Mac was hoping they could get there before this happened. “Too bad. You don’t have a choice in the matter. We’re getting up and we’re walking to the rangers’ station, unless of course you’re a whiny, wimpy, delicate desert flower.”

It’s a low blow, calling Jack something the SEALs used to say to poke fun at their Army counterparts, but, at least for the moment, it works because Jack mumbles something at Mac that’s at least half profanity while he hefts himself up out of the snow. Mac knows that virtually no one would be able to fight through the hypothermia at this point but then that was the point of Delta training — they’re the toughest of the tough, not just physically, but psychologically, too. That training may be the only reason Jack survives this, assuming that this is enough to get them there.

*****

Mac can see the rangers’ station up ahead, and Jack is still somewhat conscious, even though Mac knows Jack’s well into severe hypothermia, walking or not. 

Mac adjusts his grip on Jack and points with his free hand. “Look! There’s the rangers’ station. We’re almost there!” he says, hoping to spur Jack on. For the first time since Jack fell in the water, the fear that Mac’s been carrying begins to lift. 

But only a few yards ahead, Jack falters. It’s been happening since Jack first fell in the water, so it’s not initially concerning, until Jack doesn’t move or respond to his name.

“Jack?” Mac asks again. He shakes Jack and quickly pulls his glove off to check Jack’s pulse. It’s there, barely. Mac times it, and it counts up to a paltry forty-two beats per minute. It’s unbelievable that Jack was still upright until now and Mac knows there’s no hope of getting him back up now. 

Mac pulls out the sat phone and hits the speed dial for Matty. 

“Mac, tell me you’re there,” Matty says when she answers. Her voice is thick with concern and Mac wishes he could tell her that they were.

“We’re almost there, but Jack’s unconscious and his pulse is pretty slow. He’s gonna need more help than just a warm blanket. Can you get a medic on the phone to walk me through what I’ll need to do when I get there?”

“Yes, but how far out are you?” Matty asks.

“Maybe 150 yards?” Mac guesses.

“Can you get him there? Dalton’s not as svelte as he once was,” Matty says incisively.

“I’ve got to. He’s dying,” Mac says simply. It’s not something Mac wants to think about, not something he wants to say out loud because it feels more real this way, but Mac knows it was already real long before he spoke those words aloud. “I’ll call back when we get there,” Mac says and then cuts the call.

Then, with what little strength he has, because he’s cold and shivering and exhausted from half-dragging Jack through the Rockies for the last two hours, Mac hoists Jack up and over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry. He staggers as he walks but he does everything he can not to fall. The last thing Jack needs is a head injury to top this off. 

By the time Mac sets Jack on the ground by the door, he can't feel his hands or arms. This compounds the problem of the door being locked as Mac can't even begin to manipulate a lock pick. Breaking the door down, while requiring fewer fine motor skills, is a less desirable option since once they're inside Mac would like to be able to close the door again. 

Instead Mac flips open his knife, putting the leather punch on the bottom of the hinge and hitting it up with the palm of his hand. It hurts, the motion sending bolts of pain through his hand and up his arm as the nerves misfire from Mac’s own worsening hypothermia. 

His hand and arm throbbing, Mac forces free the last hinge pin. The door doesn’t come loose which is both a blessing — since it didn’t come down on Mac’s head — and a curse. Mac begins beating the edges of the door with his fist, slowly cracking the ice that holds the door to the frame. After a couple of minutes, Mac manages to walk the door out from the jam. 

With the door set aside, Mac drags Jack’s limp body inside. There are so many things that need to be done simultaneously and Mac feels at a loss — Jack is fading fast and he can’t do it all. But the first thing Mac learned in EOD training was that panic won’t help, so he takes three deep breaths, centers himself, and pulls the sat phone from his pocket. 

The line clicks before it even rings on Mac’s end. “Mac?” Matty’s concerned voice is loud through the tiny receiver and Mac puts the phone on speaker, setting it aside while he begins gathering an armload of firewood.

“We’re inside. I’m trying to start a fire in the stove,” Mac answers.

“And Jack?” 

“Unconscious. I had to carry him the rest of the way.” The ease of the sentence doesn’t begin to describe Mac’s own exhaustion, but his own condition is hardly a concern compared to Jack’s. He elects not to mention his own hypothermia.

“Have you located any first aid supplies?”

The thread of panic flares bright for a moment and Mac takes another deep breath before answering. “Not yet. I’ve got to get this fire going, I still need to put the door back on the hinges — I had to take it down to get in without destroying our ability to keep out the cold, I need to strip Jack out of his clothes because they’re frozen solid and get him into something warm, and yes, I also need to find the first aid supplies. But until we have ambient heat, the rest of that can wait.”

“Okay, Mac. You’re doing good. You just let us know when you’re ready to talk about treating Jack. I’ve got Dr. Eisenbaum here with me and she can talk you through everything,” Matty says. Mac’s not stupid; he can hear the change in the tone of her voice. She’s muting her own concern because she doesn’t want to add to Mac’s obvious distress. It’s a tad patronizing, but mostly Mac is just grateful that he doesn’t have to be calm for both of them. 

In what seems to Mac to be the first thing to go right all day, the wood that’s been stored inside the cabin is dry. With a little rolled up newspaper, the wood catches nicely and Mac fiddles with the damper to maximize heat inside the cabin without suffocating them with smoke. Once that’s settled, he rehangs the door. That feat is significantly harder when done alone and with numb hands, but somehow he gets the door up without fumbling either of the hinge pins into the snow. 

“I’m trying to find dry clothes and blankets,” Mac says. He puts the phone on speaker so that he can work and talk, and sets it on the small table beside the stove.

“Good,” Matty praises, and patronizing or not, the warmth in her voice is a balm. “How are you holding up?”

“A little panicked, honestly,” Mac admits as he lifts a stack of blankets off a shelf.

“I figured that one out for myself, Mac. I was asking if you were alright physically,” Matty clarifies gently.

Mac sets the blankets on top of the stove in a large pot to warm, careful that they don’t touch the stove and catch fire. “I’ve probably got mild hypothermia, but it’s nothing that won’t be cured by warming up this cabin.”

“Alright,” Matty says, relenting from her push for information. “Can you talk to me about what you’re doing now?”

“Well, the stove is burning nicely, I somehow rehung the door by myself, blankets are warming, and I’m moving one of the mattresses to the floor in front of the stove so that when I strip Jack and lay him down, he doesn’t lose what little heat he still has to the floor.”

“That’s smart,” Matty agrees softly.

“I’ve also found a couple of CamelBack bladders,” Mac continues. “I’m going to try to heat up some water on the stove and fill them up to act like hot water bottles, which should help warm Jack’s blood if I place them correctly. I think I saw the first aid stuff in one of the larger cabinets, but I haven’t really had a chance to look through it yet.”

“Good work,” Matty praises again. It’s childish, but having his efforts validated helps soothe the panic that simmers just under the surface that’s saying that he’s not going to be fast enough to save Jack.

Mac starts undressing Jack by pulling the boots and socks off first. It’s hard work wriggling wet and semi-frozen clothes off of a limp body, but Mac knows that if Jack makes it, there’s a good chance they’re both going to have to hike out, unless the weather clears soon. Cutting off Jack’s only change of clothes would effectively trap them in the cabin until evac becomes possible. It’s a possiblity that could prove deadly later on.

Despite Mac’s exhaustion and lack of dexterity, the adrenaline propelling him forwards means that he has Jack entirely undressed in only a couple of minutes. He lays out one of the now warm blankets on the mattress and hauls Jack on top of it, quickly covering him with the rest of the warmed blankets. 

With the now-empty pot Mac steps out onto the porch and scoops up a bunch of snow. He puts it on the stove to melt and warm, and turns to the first aid cabinet.  
“Alright, Matty. I’ve got Jack warming under heated blankets and I’m warming the snow for the hot water bottles. Tell me what I’m looking for in the first aid cabinet.”

There’s a pause and Mac can hear some muffled words and moving around. “Hey, Mac. It’s Dr. Eisenbaum from medical.”

They dispense with the pleasantries quickly and get down to business. Most of what Mac needs is in the cabinet and the rest they’ll either make do without or figure it out as they go. Unfortunately, there are only two bags of the IV solution they need and both are frozen solid. Carefully, so that the bags don’t melt and burst, Mac wraps them in a towel and places them in the water that’s warming on the stove. 

“While you’re waiting on the saline, go ahead and start the IVs,” instructs Dr. Eisenbaum. “I’m gonna tell you upfront that he’s going to be a hard stick. He’s cold so his veins are probably constricted, and to add to that, hypothermia — as you’ve probably learned by now — has a diuretic effect which then leads to low blood pressure. Don’t worry if it takes a few tries to get them done; he can’t feel it anyway.”

Mac isn’t exactly enthused by the idea of having to poke Jack repeatedly to get the IVs working, but there’s not much of a choice.

“Can I add a warm compress to the site to dilate the veins?” Mac asks.

“That’s a smart idea. Also, use two tourniquets. I learned that trick from an ER nurse,” Dr. Eisenbaum admits with a laugh.

Mac gets everything ready, and then digs around for something he can use to warm Jack’s arms. In the cabinet where he found the first aid supplies, there are hand warming packets, little packs that, when popped, undergo an exothermic reaction. Mac squeezes the little foil wrapper and then shakes the contents to speed up the reaction. In a moment, the package is warm and he presses it firmly to the crook of Jack’s right arm.

Making the best of the situation, Mac also alternates which of his hands he holds the pack in place with. Hopefully with warmer fingers, he can do this without fumbling the needle too much.

“It’s been about three minutes. Is that enough?” Mac asks.

“Yeah, whatever good it’s gonna do is probably done. Do you know how to start an IV?” 

Mac has, unfortunately, had to learn a few things over the years, emergency medicine being one of them. “Yeah.”

“Alright, well good luck.”

Mac gently slaps the warmed skin for a few seconds and then carefully uncaps the needle. He steels himself for making a mess of Jack’s arm but to his great surprise, blood backs up into the catheter on the first try and he carefully tapes everything in place.

“Got that one on the first try,” Mac announces.

“Nice work!” Dr. Eisenbaum exclaims. Her genuine surprise and celebratory tone bolster Mac a bit as he moves to Jack’s other arm. 

Despite the extra tourniquet and the careful warming of Jack’s veins — using a new hot pack no less — Mac is forced to stick Jack again and again, for a total of five tries, before he successfully locates a vein. It’s not his greatest work, but it’s better than failure.

“How are the bags of saline coming along?” asks Dr. Eisenbaum.

Mac finishes tucking Jack back in and moves to the stove. The water isn’t even hot enough for nucleate boiling and Mac cautiously dips a finger in the pot. It’s warm, which isn’t exactly diagnostic and certainly doesn’t mean it’s as warm as it ought to be given Mac’s own, slowly abating, hypothermia.

Mac pokes around for a thermometer in the medicine cabinet, and then places the tip in the water. “ERROR”, it proclaims loudly after five seconds, which comes as no surprise since medical thermometers have such a narrow range. Mac sighs and sets it down, putting his hat and gloves back on. Out on the steps, Mac realizes just how much he’s warmed up. Quickly, he checks around the outside of the cabin, nearly giving up until he finds the outdoor thermometer nailed to a nearby tree. He pries it free with his pocket knife and heads back in.

Carefully, Mac warms the thermometer to room temperature, which is now just above freezing in the cabin, and then to his own body temperature by holding it under his arm. Slowly, he lowers it into the water and prays that it doesn’t shatter from the temperature change before he gets a reading.

“I’m reading about 110F,” Mac announces to the sat phone.

“Perfect. Go ahead and hook them up,” Eisenbaum directs.

Eisenbaum doesn’t seem to be aware of the environmental conditions that Mac’s working with, so it takes Mac a minute to figure out how he wants to proceed. If he just hangs the bags in the cabin, the fluid will cool before it gets to Jack and won’t do any good to warm him. Eventually, he settles on wrapping the bags and tubing in heated towels, and then putting the bags one under each shoulder in lieu of an IV pump. 

With the IVs hooked up, the hot water is now free, and Mac quickly fills the water bladders. Careful not to let all the almost-warm air out from under Jack’s blankets, Mac slides the bladders between the layers of cloth, putting one in Jack’s groin and the other in his right armpit. He relays the information to the doctor and waits for new instructions. 

“Just keep switching the cool blankets and water bottles for warm ones and hope it works,” Eisenbaum tells Mac. It’s less reassuring than Mac would like and he feels helpless just sitting beside Jack and watching. 

But the blankets and bladders cool fast enough that Mac keeps relatively busy, and soon enough the cabin is even warm enough for him to remove his outer layers. When he’s not working on Jack, Mac warms himself by the oven. 

Given that they’re down to “wait and see,” Mac ends the call to the Phoenix to conserve battery life, and instead texts in the updates. Slowly but surely, Jack’s temperature rises degree by degree, and his heart rate and respiration begin to pick up. Mac continues to make sure the blankets are warm and the IVs are insulated. 

By the time that Jack’s temperature is above the cutoff for severe hypothermia — at least as measured with an outdoor thermometer wedged under his butt — the sun has long since set. In the interim period, Mac has already made eaten dinner from some dried goods that were left in the cabin and gathered more firewood from outside to keep the stove burning throughout the night. But even though Jack needs continued care, Mac is exhausted from his own brush with hypothermia. He pulls the other mattress pad onto the floor next to Jack, gets out his sleeping bag, and sets his watch to wake him in an hour.

*****

The high-pitched beeping of Mac’s watch alarm drags him painfully to consciousness. His entire body aches and his eyes throb from being forced open when he so desperately needs more sleep. But Jack needs to have his blankets and hot water bottles rotated, and it’s up to Mac to make sure that happens. 

Mac crawls out of his sleeping bag and staggers towards the stove. The blankets he hung over the stove are toasty and Mac quickly rotates out the old for the new. The IV bags are long empty, and Mac disconnects the tubing from the cannulas and sets them aside. 

Suddenly, Jack shifts and mumbles something. In an instant, Mac’s fatigue is gone, replaced with relief and excitement.

“Say that again,” Mac says, trying to get Jack to come around.

“Watch,” Jack mumbles.

“‘Watch’ what?” Mac asks, more than a little confused because the battery lantern he found earlier was dead, and they’ve got nothing more than moonlight to illuminate their cabin.

“‘S stupid,” Jack grumbles.

That’s when Mac realizes that he never turned off the alarm on his watch. He’d been worried he might fall back to sleep before he got the job done, plus it was annoying enough to be motivation to get Jack taken care of so he could go back to sleep. Quickly, Mac squeezes the buttons on the side of his watch and silences the alarm.

“Better?” Mac asks.

Jack nods, though he’s hardly coordinated. “Shhhhh,” he says softly and Mac watches with relieved amusement as Jack goes back to sleep almost instantly.

With Mac’s work done, there’s no reason he can’t do the same, so Mac climbs back into his still warm sleeping bag and passes out for another hour.

*****

Mac repeats the process every hour until sunrise, though Jack only shows signs of consciousness one more time. But the best news, even better than Jack’s improving vitals, is the weather report. The stormfront that started all this nonsense has moved north of them overnight; it opens up the possibility of medevac that otherwise would have had to wait another two to three days. 

While they wait on help to arrive, Mac does what he can to pack up and continues to rotate the blankets and warm water bottles. He meets the medevac crew outside and helps them carry their gear into the cabin. They work quickly but carefully to bundle Jack in as many layers as they can before hurrying to the extraction point. One by one, they’re hoisted into the helo and then Mac’s pushed to the back, away from Jack, while the paramedics get to work.

It’s hard to watch. The paramedics have their work cut out for them and the concern that plays over their faces while they treat Jack just drives home the fact that despite Jack’s brief moments of consciousness, he’s barely hanging on. Mac looks out the window over the white capped Rockies and presses his palms together to still his anxious fidgeting.

The high pitched whir of an IO drill grabs Mac’s attention, and he watches as one of the medics drills a needle into Jack’s leg. The cannulae that Mac so carefully left in Jack’s arms have probably already failed, and helplessness swamps Mac. Out here in the mountains, miles from civilization, and armed with only a half-stocked first aid kit, Mac was trying to do what needs to be done in an ER or ICU. He had no chance of success, and if the weather hadn’t changed, Mac would still be changing blankets and water bottles while Jack slowly faded. 

Mac blinks away his tears and looks back out the window over the fresh snow. The Rockies are beautiful, but Mac hasn’t felt this small and powerless in a long, long time.

*****

“Hey, blondie,” Matty says. 

Mac looks up from where he’d zoned out staring at the floor. “Hey, Matty.”

“You look like shit,” she observes with a soft smile.

Mac laughs. “Yeah, I feel like it. But I don’t really have anything to change-”

Matty holds up a bag filled with clothes. “You were saying?”

Mac smiles and takes the bag. “Thanks, Matty.”

“You heard anything about Jack yet?” she asks.

Mac shakes his head. “He crashed just before we landed and he had to be intubated. Last I heard, they were doing some of the more invasive rewarming measures, but the nurse didn’t know anything else. They said they’d let me know if things change.”

Matty nods and puts her hand on Mac’s knee. “You did good. You kept Jack alive and stable long enough for help to arrive. How about you go find a place to shower and change? I’ll wait here in case there’s an update.”

Part of Mac wants to refuse. He’s been keeping watch this whole time, leaving now almost seems like stepping out of the race at the finish line. But that’s exhaustion and emotions talking, not common sense. Gratefully, he accepts the break and heads off in search of hygiene and a modicum of self-care.

*****

“Are you seriously gonna take me outside dressed like this?” Jack demands. “I nearly died from cold exposure not a week ago and you’ve got me in shorts, an Aloha shirt, and flip flops. It’s like you want me to die!” 

Mac sighs. “Jack, we live in LA and it’s April. You literally can’t die of hypothermia here at this time of year. Calm down.”

“I will not ‘calm down.’ I might relapse like I did in the chopper!”

“You had afterdrop, not a relapse, and that only happened because your limbs were still cold. They’re warm now. You’re fine,” Mac explains for the umpteenth time.

“You don’t know that,” Jack pouts as Mac wheels Jack out the front door of the hospital.

“Are you sure neurology checked you over? Maybe they read the wrong brain scan,” Mac ponders.

“What are you getting at? Are you saying there’s something wrong with my brain?” Jack shouts, drawing the attention of several people in the parking lot.

Mac shrugs and parks the chair by the car. “You tell me. I’m not the one who’s making up fake medical conditions and asking the same questions over and over again.”

Jack glares as he gets out of the wheelchair and into the car. “Hearty har-har. Glad my near death experience is all one big joke to you, pal.”

Mac smiles as he climbs in, having passed off the chair to a nurse who was heading inside. “Not the experience, just your histrionics.”

Jack shouts something which is a gross abuse of both the English language as well as grammar, and then they get into an argument over the function of a gerund, something which Jack strongly asserts was the name of his high school gym teacher.

After a prolonged debate, followed by Jack looking up his school’s now digitized yearbook, Jack manages to change the topic of conversation without ever divulging the name of the gym teacher in question. 

“You know, this was a whole lot better than getting shot,” Jack comments as Mac unloads their things from the car.

Mac laughs. “Good. Just maybe wait a few weeks before doing it again.”

“Hey, I said was better. I didn’t say I liked it.”

With one hand still holding all their stuff, Mac keys into his house, Jack trailing behind him. “I don’t know, you really liked the nurse who kept checking your core temp. You told her she had gentle hands and knew her way around a rectal thermometer,” Mac reminds Jack.

Jack grins wistfully. “Yeah, true. Alright. I’ll wait before getting hypothermia again. But only two weeks!”

And given their line of work, that’s probably about how long they have before one of them gets injured again. But in the meantime, Mac’s going to sleep — with lots and lots of blankets.


End file.
